This invention relates to a method of affixing or "tipping on" envelopes and letter paper onto a fanfolded continuous carrier sheet, and the resulting assembly.
Word processing systems of various types have made it possible to produce documents at high speed. The term "word-processing systems" is used broadly herein, and includes such devices as memory typewriters and computers equipped with an output printer. To accommodate the speed of such systems, it is now common practice to mount documents to a continuous carrier sheet which may be run continuously through the word processor printer. The documents may be of various types, such as letterhead stationery, envelopes, multi-layer snap sets, although generally documents of only a single type are used on a single carrier sheet. Mounting documents to a carrier sheet in such a way that the documents are easily removable from the sheet is known as affixing or "tipping on" the documents. Typically, the documents are held to the carrier sheet by spots or patterns of a strippable glue. The carrier sheet is conveniently fanfolded in a short form, such that the panels are substantially shorter than the documents. The documents are attached to alternate panels of the carrier, and all documents therefore face upward on the folded carrier sheet. A typical short form, fanfolded carrier with affixed documents is described in Cone, U.S. Pat. No. 4,091,987.
For the proper feeding of carrier-mounted documents, it is important that the documents be overlapped or shingled, so that the upper edge of each succeeding document lies under the lower edge of the previous document as they move through a word processor printer. As shown in U.S. Pat. No. 4,091,987, this arrangemnt requires that the total length of two adjacent panels be somewhat less than the length of the document. Mounting the documents at high speed in this fashion, however, is difficult. The complexity of the required machinery is exemplified by Cone, U.S. Pat. No. 4,270,967. In that patent documents of the same type (either letters or envelopes) are first overlapped, then fed in overlapped condition to a pre-glued carrier sheet.
For many applications, it would be desirable to supply a carrier sheet in which envelopes and letter sheets are positioned alternately on a carrier sheet. Such an arrangement would permit a letter and its envelope (or an envelope and its letter) to be printed sequentially, without the necessity of separately feeding two different carrier sheets through the word processor printer, and would greatly simplify matching letters to the proper envelope. The problem, and one solution to the problem, are set out in Dierks, U.S. Pat. No. 4,335,845. Dierks' solution to the problem of providing both letter sheets and envelopes on a standard fanfolded carrier sheet is to provide a unique envelope-letter sheet device which is attached to each panel of a fanfolded standard carrier. This solution has a number of drawbacks.
A similar approach has been utilized by Moore Business Forms, Inc. of 1205 N. Milwaukee Ave., Glenview, Ill. 60025 to affix pre-printed envelopes and letter sheets to a single panel of a standard carrier sheet. Each envelope is affixed on the same panel as a letterhead sheet, in a separate glueing operation. This approach has substantial advantages over Dierks' approach. For example, it allows the letter sheet to be preprinted or to be a multiple layer snap set.
Neither Dierks' system nor Moore Business Forms' system permits continuous overlapping of the documents. Envelopes overlap letter sheets, but letter sheets do not overlap the envelopes on succeeding carrier sheet panels